Monaco GP reveals strengths of Ferrari SF-24 car: 2024 F1 title is no longer impossible. In the atypical Monte Carlo circuit, new strengths of the SF-24 F1 project emerge.

As was inevitable, the race on the streets of Monte Carlo was not the best in terms of excitement, but the three days of the Monaco Grand Prix were rich in interest, crowned by the beautiful victory of Scuderia Ferrari and the local hero Charles Leclerc. The SF-24’s struggles in slow corners did not promise an encouraging weekend for the Prancing Horse, but in Monaco’s extreme setting, other qualities of the 2024 Ferrari were displayed, reinforcing the belief that it has the all the qualities required in order to compete in the 2024 Formula 1 championship challenge.

It is often said, with good reason, that Monte Carlo is an atypical track within the Formula 1 calendar, not very representative of the overall competitive values. However, its extreme nature highlights the strengths and weaknesses of the cars, allowing a better evaluation and understanding of their characteristics. Traction and agility in slow corners are two of the most rewarding qualities in the Principality, where Red Bull and McLaren continue to show excellent performance, unlike Ferrari, which has long struggled in low-speed sections in the first part of the current season.

At the same time, Monaco shows that at low speeds and without the aerodynamic downforce pressing the car down, the Ferrari is among the best in absorbing the bumps, allowing its drivers to attack the curbs without unsettling the car. This is a quality of the SF-24 that has finally manifested fully and allowed the Prancing Horse to compete on equal terms with McLaren, prevailing in the qualifying session by a fraction of a tenth. The benefits won’t be limited to Monte Carlo but will also be useful in the next round of the Formula 1 campaign, at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Canada and later in the fall when the series will head to Singapore at the Marina Bay Street Circuit. All this without forgetting that Ferrari has another strength in fast corners, with the potential to perform well on tracks like Silverstone.

The verdict from the Monaco Grand Prix weekend is not that Ferrari has suddenly become the favorite for the championship, but that it has the qualities to fight for the top step of the podium on certain tracks, with the awareness of having to chase Red Bull and McLaren on other specific circuits.

At the end of the Monte Carlo race, Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur pointed out that there will be different tracks with varying designs and characteristics that will suit McLaren or Red Bull better, leading to ups and downs until the end of the 2024 Formula 1 season. Red Bull itself, despite struggling on Monaco’s bumps, had the potential to reach the podium with Max Verstappen if the world champion hadn’t hit the wall in his final run in the qualifying session. However, the Dutchman’s mistake is a reflection of an Austrian team that has finally been put under some unprecedented pressure, where the weaknesses of the project and strategic or driving inaccuracies are no longer masked as they were in the last few years. The French manager notes that Max Verstappen made more mistakes at the Imola circuit than in the last three seasons combined, attributing this to the increased pressure when pushing harder. He explains that when drivers are in their comfort zone, they don’t make mistakes, and he believes that Red Bull was previously in such a situation. Nonetheless, the Ferrari team boss warns against drawing any conclusions, as he expects Red Bull to come back stronger starting with the next round of the campaign, the Canadian Grand Prix.

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For now, with the splendid victory in the Monaco Grand Prix, Ferrari erases the painful 2023 Formula 1 edition. It’s not just the car that has improved since then, but also the setup and preparation for the weekend. Even before the event, Carlos Sainz explained how, in recent weeks, work had been done in Maranello in order to understand the reasons for the lack of competitiveness in last season’s Grand Prix on the streets of Monte Carlo. Additionally, there was work on optimizing the setup for the very important qualifying lap, a discipline that had not seemed like a strong point of the SF-24 single-seater. Even so, Carlos Sainz appeared confident right from the media day on Thursday, when he pointed out that everything here is decided in qualifying and that he was aware this aspect had not been Ferrari’s strong point this year, but at the same time he believed that with a couple of adjustments, Ferrari could in fact win in Monaco.

The reason for such optimism was that Ferrari’s lesser incisiveness in 2024 qualifying was not solely due to the project but to an approach generally aimed at prioritizing race pace even in the setup. Fred Vasseur explained that they had convinced everyone that points are awarded on Sunday. This meant that in preparing for the weekend and in the setup choices, the focus had to be more on the race, which was paying off. In Monaco, the focus was certainly on the performance in the qualifying session, but in Canada, the story would be different. This year, their preparation had been much more focused on Sunday. This approach was appropriately adjusted in Monte Carlo, where the Maranello team did not hesitate to emphasize the most important qualifying session of the season, validating a specific setup for the flying lap that contributed to Charles Leclerc’s great pole position.

Another already known quality that fully emerged from Ferrari’s victory in the Principality is the car’s driveability. On more than one occasion, representatives of the Italian side have emphasized that driveability was a major goal for the 2024 Formula 1 project, after the unpredictable and challenging SF-23 single-seater. The progress in this area was already evident after the first races, but the confidence transmitted by the car to the drivers, particularly Charles Leclerc, was another rewarding factor in the delicate Monaco qualifying, where pushing to the limit and grazing the walls is absolutely essential.

Preserving driveability and balance will be one of the key aspects in developing these single-seaters, which could strengthen or break the current balance between Red Bull, Ferrari, and McLaren. Proof of this is Aston Martin, which has struggled for a year to turn updates and increased aerodynamic load into improvements on the stopwatch due to imperfect balance, a difficult situation also explained several times by Fernando Alonso, who pointed out that it is in the nature of these cars. When you add downforce, they become more critical and difficult to drive, as highlighted by the Spanish driver. The risk is that even one of the top teams could now make a similar misstep to Aston Martin, a more likely hypothesis as pressure increases in a title chase that is more open than ever after the Monaco Grand Prix.